His day had been going pretty well - even McKindy turning several different shades of awkward had been funny enough to make up for the fact that Danny had to somehow get through a one-on-one animagus class with him the next day, after being caught with his tongue in the mouth of Aaron’s pseudo-granddaughter. He’d cross that canyon when he came to it - so whilst Dardanius would have definitely prefered to keep doing what he had been doing, he didn’t mind too much that his day now involved an impromptu magizoobotany class. It wasn’t one of his usually scheduled subjects, but Professor Bennett was always entertaining.

The less appealing aspect of having to help out a professor who had screwed up was that all the upper years had been summoned, apparently, which meant that, well, that everyone would be there. ‘Everyone’ being there wasn’t usually a problem, but that was before Danny had endured one of the weirdest conversations of his life so far. Now ‘everyone’ hanging out together felt sort of forced and unnatural, which was monumentally unfair because he’d spent a lot of the first half of term being awkward and unnatural around Marissa. Now everything was more or less perfect with Marissa (the more being everything to do with Marissa; the less being everything to do with Danny), and he’d managed to make things weird with Holland, instead.

He kept having the same cyclical series of thoughts, which centred on the interpretation that he shouldn’t have said anything to Holland. Yet he’d concluded that blaming himself for speaking out was flawed: the moment Danny had realized the motive driving his behaviours, whether he’d said anything or not, he would have acted peculiarly in front of Holland. They would have noticed and asked what was going on, and the same outcome would have been achieved. The only option available to them was to keep pretending like everything was just fine, and not at all weird, until they actually believed it. No problem.

So Danny enjoyed the comfort afforded to him by joining Marissa down to the greenhouses, but they got separated on entry. Immediately upon entering the building he became distracted by the chaos contained within. From the silently rebelling daffodils to the professor floating cheerfully, this class fit every relevant definition of mayhem. Despite its apparent seriousness, Danny couldn’t help smirking at the situation as he wandlessly stupefied one of the bright blue, over-sized insects buzzing up near the ceiling. He summoned it towards him before it occurred to the sixth year that he would want to be wearing gloves in order to handle the creature with the potential to sting him. “Here, hang onto this for me,” he said to the person standing nearest , gesturing to the creature (its body similar shade of blue to Danny’s polo-shirt, which wouldn’t offer a great deal of protection from potential stings on his arms, but at least his black jeans ought to keep the lower half of his anatomy from harm) now floating unnaturally at chest-height, while he secured himself a pair of protective gloves.

Arthur was floating. Literally. Hovering a few inches off the ground, he looked like a veritable angel of chaos: he was, for some reason, barefoot, generally covered in dirt, glasses askew, and his... more

Being buried under work seemed to be Bryn’s life these days. It wasn’t really that he had to do so, but it was entirely his choice. It had become increasingly apparent to the fourth year in that past ... more

While Nolan was en route to the Finer Diner, a man wearing a bright red Muggle suit who Nolan had literally never seen before in his whole life appeared out of nowhere and proclaimed that everyone... more

Ruben had been minding his own business, almost cheerfully, when he was interrupted. By the caretaker, no less. He'd just finished beating his personal record for laps swum around the indoor pool and ... more

In a school that only required a four-class schedule, Emmett considered his five-class roster as overachieving. Not overachieving by, for example, Holland’s standards - his best friend took, like,... more

This wasn't ideal in any way whatsoever. One, why did she need to do extra work in order to correct someone else’s mistake?. Two, she had, stupidly, approached Rose’s boyfriend, Emmett. Their mutual... more

As ever, Maverick found himself trapped in some school-related dumbassery. In this case, it was an impromptu Magizoobotany class. Admittedly, it was less dumbassery than the stupid babies thing he’d... more

Grabbing a pair of gloves for himself, and another for his yearmate, Danny pulled on the only protective gear that had been provided and made his way back over to where Maverick was standing still... more

Being summoned to a random, mandatory class didn’t strictly fall into the category of things that did not cause Myfanwy some sort of minor irritation. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to go - she liked ... more

Elijah was not pleased. For starters, he didn’t even like Magizoobotany. It was an unnecessary class for his chosen careers choice and would do him little good in the long run. But it was a mandatory ... more

The older student was even less suitably dressed for this than Myfanwy was herself, looking like he’d just come from some sort of field exercise or something. Actually she recognised him, he was one... more

I don't know was not a very reassuring answer and Elijah frowned in response. He belatedly wished that he'd partnered with someone else, but really everyone else was too far away for him to get to.... more

“Immobulus, right,” Myffi nodded. She could give it a try. Her spellwork was pretty good really, at least average, and it was one of those spells that probably wouldn’t cause much damage if her aim... more

Elijah wasn’t sure how fast billywig stings worked. He felt a little giddy, but his feet were still securely on the ground. At least for the moment. It was ridiculous that they had been offered only... more

Well, it finally happened. One of her family members had the uncomfortable honor of being the first to catch her and Danny doing inappropriate stuff. They’d met in the Practical Lab so they could... more

Since their conversation after the beach party, Holland had felt awkward around Danny. Hopefully none of their friends had noticed, although Holland felt certain someone had realized there was less... more

“Thanks,” Marissa cheerfully replied. She definitely wasn’t dressed for this lesson. Holland seemed to have the right idea to cover up. Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything she could put on to cover... more

Holland took the billywig from Marissa, careful not to injure it, and deposited it in the cage that Professor Bennett had set up. They hoped the Magizoobotany professor had set up the cage so that... more

Marissa could tell that her suggestion didn’t go over well with Holland. Her friend knew how to hide their feelings from people relatively well, but Marissa wasn’t a People. She knew them. Clearly,... more

Holland was very tempted to tell Marissa that they didn’t want to talk about this either. This wasn’t true, strictly speaking; they very much wanted to talk to someone about it, but there was no one... more

It was midway through a dive that Rose Farnon realized that everyone was rushing in the direction of the greenhouse, and that was only because she nearly ran into Susan Ober as she was pulling out of ... more

Oh no. This was awful. Greenhouses were in general awful, because they were reflective glass boxes with too much light bouncing around inside, and that was basically the definition of torture by... more

Of course it was Russell. Rose would have scowled at that realization if she hadn’t been busy wondering how many billywig stings it would take for her to start floating like Professor Bennett. As far ... more

Russell, who had already been feeling significantly less energized than the riled-up foliage around them, wilted even further at her snapped response. It was somewhat surprising (a good type of... more

As Russell continued to speak, Rose continued to stare at him flatly, wondering if he had even listened to a word she had said. Well, it was clear that he had listened, but it wasn’t clear if he had... more

Painfully aware, now literally, that Professor Bennett had instructed them not to cause any harm to the bugs, Russell had to fight to keep his hands at his side. It was hard to fight the automatic... more

Probably for the purposes of showing that he wasn’t utterly useless, Russell conjured some ice and held it against his neck. Rose raised her eyebrows. Her billywig sting didn’t feel like it required... more